Deuteronomy 23:1

He that is wounded in the stones,.... In any of them, not accidentally, but purposely; which are crushed and bruised by the hands of men, with a design to make him unfit for generation, or to make an

He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD. He that is wounded ... shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord.

CHAPTER 23 Who are to be excluded from the congregation, . An Edomite and Egyptian not to be abhorred, and why, ,8. No uncleanness to be in the camp, . No filthiness, . No abominable sacrifice must be, . No usury, but to strangers, ,20. Vows must be kept, . The liberty that was lawful in their neighbour’ s field or vineyard, ,25. Heb. wounded by compression, or attrition, or contusion, to wit, of the stones, which was the course the Gentiles took with infants to make them eunuchs. And these eunuchs and bastards, , seem to be not only those of other nations, as some understand it, without any foundation for such restriction, but also of the Israelites; the reason of this law being the same in all, to wit, that God would bring into disgrace those heathenish practices of making eunuchs, and getting bastards, which doubtless he would especially do among his own people. Shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord; which phrase cannot be understood so that they might not come into the church, or holy assemblies, to worship God, to pray, or hear, &c., because proselytes of any nation, being admitted to common church privileges, no less than the Jews, (as is evident from 15:15) it were absurd to think that any of the Israelites, for such a natural or involuntary defect, should be shut out from all God’ s ordinances; nor so that they were to be put out of the muster-roll of God’ s people, or to lose the privileges common to all Israelites, to wit, the benefit of the year of release or jubilee, which it is not probable the Israelites were to forfeit merely for this unculpable imperfection; but either, 1. That they should not be incorporated into the body of Israel by marriage; for so this phrase may seem to have been understood by the whole congregation of Israel, 23-25; although at that time the government was in part in the hands of such persons as are here mentioned, , or of their children, seeing it is apparent from Ezra 10 that many priests and Levites and other officers and rulers of Israel were married to strange women, whose issue are by this law excluded from all share in the government, and for that, among other reasons, Nehemiah separated them from Israel by virtue of the law here following. Or, 2. That they should not be admitted to honours and offices either in the church or commonwealth of Israel; and so the congregation of the Lord doth not here signify, as commonly it doth, the body of the people, but the society of the elders or rulers of the people, who, as they represent the whole congregation, and act in their name, and for their service and good, so they are sometimes called by the name of the congregation, as 24 25 Joshua 20:6,9 , compared with ; and ,2,4 29:1,10,20, compared with 29:6; and of the congregation of God, as it is in the Hebrew of .

Deuteronomy 23:1 He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD.Ver. 1. Or hath his privy member cut off.] As it is a barbarous custom at this day among the Turks, to deprive various Christian children of their privities, supplying the uses of nature with a silver quill. This was first brought in among them by Selymus II, out of jealousy lest his eunuchs were not so chaste as they should have been, in keeping their ladies’ beds. Such are usually effeminate, and unfit to bear office. Shall not enter into the congregation,] i.e., Shall not go in and out before the people as a public officer. Since such should be drained from the dregs, and sifted from the brans of the vulgar: they should be eminent and eximious persons, higher than the rest, as Saul, by the head and shoulders. Turk. Hist.

(1) The rule that a eunuch should not enter into the congregation was doubtless intended to prevent the Israelitish rulers from making eunuchs of their brethren the children of Israel. As a set off to this apparent harshness towards the man who had been thus treated, we must read Isaiah 56:3-4, in which a special promise is given to the eunuchs that keep God’s Sabbaths and take hold of His covenant. God will give to them within His house and within His walls “a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters—an everlasting name that shall not be cut off.” As a special calamity it was foretold to Hezekiah that some of his descendants should be eunuchs in the palace of the King of Babylon. But Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, in whom this prophecy was fulfilled, have ennobled the “children that are of their sort” for evermore. We have no means of knowing whether the eunuchs that were in the service of the kings of Israel or Judah (1 Samuel 8:15; 1 Kings 22:9; 2 Kings 8:6; 2 Kings 9:32, &c.) were Israelites by birth or not. Ebedmelech, the Ethiopian, who received a special blessing from Jeremiah (Jeremiah 39:15-18), was a foreigner, and so very possibly were most, if not all, of his kind in Israel. As to the second clause of this verse, it must be remembered that circumcision was the sign of the covenant of Jehovah; mutilation a form of heathen self-devotion. (See Gal. 5, 12, Revised New Testament, Margin, and Bishop Lightfoot’s comment on that place.) St. Paul’s words in Galatians receive a double meaning from this law. By doing what he refers to, they would cut themselves off from the congregation of the Lord. Rashi also gives another meaning, which would connect the precept with Leviticus 15:2.

CHAPTER XXIII Neither eunuchs, bastards, Ammonites, nor Moabites, shall be incorporated with the genuine Israelites, 1-3. The reason why the Ammonites and Moabites were excluded, 4-6. Edomites and Egyptians to be respected, 7. Their descendants in the third generation may be incorporated with the Israelites, 8. Cautions against wickedness when they go forth against their enemies, 9. To keep the camp free from every defilement, and the reason why, 10-14. The slave who had taken refuge among them is not to be delivered up to his former master, 15, 16. There shall be no prostitutes nor sodomites in the land, 17. The hire of a prostitute or the price of a dog is not to be brought into the house of God, 18. The Israelites shall not lend on usury to each other, 19; but they may take usury from strangers, 20. Vows must be diligently paid, 21-23. In passing through a vine yard or field a man may eat of the grapes or corn, but must carry away none with him, 24, 25. NOTES ON CHAP. XXIII Verse 1. Shall not enter into the congregation, c.] If by entering the congregation be meant the bearing a civil office among the people, such as magistrate, judge, &c., then the reason of the law is very plain no man with any such personal defect as might render him contemptible in the sight of others should bear rule among the people, lest the contempt felt for his personal defects might be transferred to his important office, and thus his authority be disregarded. The general meaning of these words is, simply, that the persons here designated should not be so incorporated with the Jews as to partake of their civil privileges.

Compare Leviticus 21:17-24. Such persons, exhibiting a mutilation of that human nature which was made in God’s image, were rejected from the covenant entirely. However, they could be proselytes (compare Acts 8:27).

PERSONS WHO ARE NOT TO BE INTO THE , Deuteronomy 23:1-8. 1. Cut off — No doubt Moses aimed to keep the people of God free from those pernicious customs so prevalent among the Eastern nations.